Seven Deadly Heresies Speech Is Now Doctrine

[_Kishkumen]

Official publications of the Church are going to identified as intellectual property by the IRI, but not everything the IRI identifies as intellectual property is an official publication of the Church.

My, oh my. Lulz indeed.

[_RockSlider]

you guys still carrying on with duffus?

wow BC, it looks like there are bennefits to being a duffus

http://www.urbandictionary.com/define.php?term=duffus

[_Runtu]

you guys still carrying on with duffus?

wow BC, it looks like there are bennefits to being a duffus

http://www.urbandictionary.com/define.php?term=duffus

Nah, I was just curious to see how he dealt with McConkie's talk having been approved by Correlation. I never guessed that he would put himself in the position of deciding which official, correlated church publications are doctrine, and which are not. I'd bet McConkie would have thought that to be an eighth deadly heresy.

[_Buffalo]

bcspace, stop digging. It's official doctrine now that

[_Themis]

Nah, I was just curious to see how he dealt with McConkie's talk having been approved by Correlation. I never guessed that he would put himself in the position of deciding which official, correlated church publications are doctrine, and which are not. I'd bet McConkie would have thought that to be an eighth deadly heresy.

You rat bastard. You started this thread. Is there any ass left of bcspace's to kick.

You and green have done a great job in showing how bcspace is wrong. Some of us have trying to do this for a long time. Too bad he will probably not learn from it since he has been to vocal about his own incorrect idea on doctrine, and probably cannot humble himself enough to recognize or admit he is wrong. Oh well, fun for entertainment value. I do agree with you not wanting others to get the wrong idea that bcspace's idea of doctrine is correct.

[_Buffalo]

Runtu, I must have missed it, can you explain (or link to a previous explanation) the official COB stance on what is doctrine?

[_Runtu]

Runtu, I must have missed it, can you explain (or link to a previous explanation) the official COB stance on what is doctrine?

Approaching Mormon Doctrine

The church's statement is consistent with what J Green and I were taught at the Church Office Building: "This doctrine resides in the four “standard works” of scripture (the Holy Bible, the Book of Mormon, the Doctrine and Covenants and the Pearl of Great Price), official declarations and proclamations, and the Articles of Faith."

Where we differ from bcspace is in his interpretation of the following statement: "With divine inspiration, the First Presidency (the prophet and his two counselors) and the Quorum of the Twelve Apostles (the second-highest governing body of the Church) counsel together to establish doctrine that is consistently proclaimed in official Church publications."

bcspace interprets this to mean that church publications are doctrine, whereas J Green and I were instructed, verbally and in writing, that doctrine is authoritative in the places it "resides," as stated above. Church publications that have been through a Correlation review and approved are "consistent" with doctrine, or as J Green put it, they are "doctrinal" or "doctrinally based." They are not doctrine, per se. It's not a huge distinction, but at least when I worked for the church, it was an important one for us in producing curriculum and other materials.

Correlated materials used to carry the church's copyright, but now they bear the "Intellectual Reserve, Inc." copyright. This is how we know that a publication has been through a Correlation review, making it official. Church-affiliated organizations, such as BYU or the Thrasher Research Fund, have their own separate copyright, and in BYU's case they explicitly assert their ownership of the copyrighted material such that no one could confuse it with official church publication.

Where bcspace gets into trouble is that McConkie's speech, though given at BYU, bears an IRI copyright, meaning it has been through Correlation, which would explain why the published speech is different from the more inflammatory speech he gave from the pulpit.

According to bcspace, the speech is official doctrine of the church because, as he said, if it's in an official church publication, it's doctrine. Of course, he doesn't agree with the speech, so his first response was to say it was not doctrinal and add that his rather tormented interpretation of the speech meant that evolution is not heretical. Finally, when shown that the speech is officially published by the church, he made the astounding statement that not all official church publications are official.

Like I said, it's not a big deal. In fact, I'd say J Green and I are more generous and fair toward the church than bcspace is because we don't hold the church to every statement ever made in a church publication. I'm surprised that the church published McConkie's speech, as leaving it with a BYU copyright would have allowed people to dismiss the talk as personal opinion.

[_Buffalo]

Runtu, I must have missed it, can you explain (or link to a previous explanation) the official COB stance on what is doctrine?

Approaching Mormon Doctrine

The church's statement is consistent with what J Green and I were taught at the Church Office Building: "This doctrine resides in the four “standard works” of scripture (the Holy Bible, the Book of Mormon, the Doctrine and Covenants and the Pearl of Great Price), official declarations and proclamations, and the Articles of Faith."

Where we differ from bcspace is in his interpretation of the following statement: "With divine inspiration, the First Presidency (the prophet and his two counselors) and the Quorum of the Twelve Apostles (the second-highest governing body of the Church) counsel together to establish doctrine that is consistently proclaimed in official Church publications."

bcspace interprets this to mean that church publications are doctrine, whereas J Green and I were instructed, verbally and in writing, that doctrine is authoritative in the places it "resides," as stated above. Church publications that have been through a Correlation review and approved are "consistent" with doctrine, or as J Green put it, they are "doctrinal" or "doctrinally based." They are not doctrine, per se. It's not a huge distinction, but at least when I worked for the church, it was an important one for us in producing curriculum and other materials.

Correlated materials used to carry the church's copyright, but now they bear the "Intellectual Reserve, Inc." copyright. This is how we know that a publication has been through a Correlation review, making it official. Church-affiliated organizations, such as BYU or the Thrasher Research Fund, have their own separate copyright, and in BYU's case they explicitly assert their ownership of the copyrighted material such that no one could confuse it with official church publication.

Where bcspace gets into trouble is that McConkie's speech, though given at BYU, bears an IRI copyright, meaning it has been through Correlation, which would explain why the published speech is different from the more inflammatory speech he gave from the pulpit.

According to bcspace, the speech is official doctrine of the church because, as he said, if it's in an official church publication, it's doctrine. Of course, he doesn't agree with the speech, so his first response was to say it was not doctrinal and add that his rather tormented interpretation of the speech meant that evolution is not heretical. Finally, when shown that the speech is officially published by the church, he made the astounding statement that not all official church publications are official.

Like I said, it's not a big deal. In fact, I'd say J Green and I are more generous and fair toward the church than bcspace is because we don't hold the church to every statement ever made in a church publication. I'm surprised that the church published McConkie's speech, as leaving it with a BYU copyright would have allowed people to dismiss the talk as personal opinion.

That makes sense, thanks Runtu.

bcspace has never been consistent with his hobby horse, anyway. Adam god was published by the church, but space still claims it was never doctrine.

[_Themis]

Where we differ from bcspace is in his interpretation of the following statement: "With divine inspiration, the First Presidency (the prophet and his two counselors) and the Quorum of the Twelve Apostles (the second-highest governing body of the Church) counsel together to establish doctrine that is consistently proclaimed in official Church publications."

How he gets that interpretation is a mystery. I see nowhere that it's state that everything in church publications is doctrine, only that doctrine can be found in them. We have asked him to explain how saying x(doctrine) is in Y(church publications) means everything in Y is X. Were still waiting.

[_J Green]

Well stated, Runtu.

And the distinction between doctrine and doctrinal (consistent with doctrine or doctrinally based) can be fairly small or fairly large, depending on your point of view.

I have two pets: a dog and a cat. But they're both black and about the same size (the dog is a poodle--curses!). And the dog likes to eat the cat's food instead of her own food. And when one goes outside, the other will go outside as well. Looking simply at behavior, color, size, and other factors, my youngest daughter thought for years that our pets were the same kind of animal and didn't understand how a dog was really different than a cat.

Similarly, when you look at the concepts of doctrine and doctrinal from a certain point of view, there isn't much difference. Members and critics alike can certainly hold the Church to what it publishes. Correlation and publishing do have the effect of making something official. And anyone can certainly call it that: official, a teaching, a work published by the Church, etc. Every institution has a level of responsibility and ownership for the material it vets and publishes, and the Church is no different in that regard.

However, from other perspectives that are just as important, cats are not dogs. And in this sense, the difference between doctrine and doctrinal is just as important. And this difference is about revealed knowledge versus our assumptions about (or the interpretation of) revealed knowledge. If you look at the D&C, there is a pattern of Joseph Smith going to God and saying something like, "You said this in this verse of scripture--what did you mean?" And this is followed by an explanation. Contrast this type of revealed knowledge with McConkie's wonderful explanation of how after the revelation on priesthood, he realized that they had made assumptions about the meaning of scripture that were corrected as a result of the actual revelation (revealed knowledge). So doctrine is the actual revealed knowledge. And when we base our teaching, counseling, programs, and guidance on our best understanding of this revealed knowledge, the Church tries to ensure that there is a consistent standard for the Church as a body that this material will be consistently applied. Hence Correlation. Every large organization seeks standardization and quality control. But we should also realize that, just as McConkie found out during the revelation on the priesthood, we may need to correct the assumptions that we've had.

But understanding and interpreting revealed knowledge is a tricky thing. Think of the star prophecy (Numbers) and the suffering servant figure (Isaiah) that were so widely and variously interpreted in ancient Israel. Think of the resurrected Savior in Luke having to explain the scriptures to his future Church leaders on the road to Emmaus. Or Paul and Peter's disagreement about what past revelation meant about current Church administration vis-a-vis the Gentiles during the Jerusalem Counsel. This aspect of understanding revelation versus simply making assumptions about revelation is messy business.

And it's in this sense that I think the distinction is important. So when a new location for Ur is suggested, the Church updates its map section to show both the old location and the new location with question marks. When our understanding of coinage invalidates our past assumptions about the text of Alma 11, we can change the chapter heading to reflect out new interpretation or understanding of past revealed knowledge. These tools had been officially vetted through correlation and published with the Church's copyright but we can still change them as our understanding changes because these items are not revealed knowledge itself (doctrine) but simply our best understanding, interpretation, or application of that revealed knowledge.

My two cents.